I have plantar fasciitis pretty bad, but it's sort of gone into remission again. They have nice insoles for easing it (I get ones with good arch support and NOT the ones where it's like your heel is on a ball. THAT aggravates it.)

Yeah, I am hoping this place is as good as it seems. My cousin works for a different branch of the company and has some complaints, but a lot of it is based on changes over 14 years of working there. The big thing is how slow the company does things at the moment. But overall it is a major improvement from retail.

Fact: Working on concrete floors for so long has caused me to develop plantar fasciitis. Another reason for "yay, office job!"

No regrets Elara! I hope you land somewhere better and don't look back.

I still get a little giddy when I think about how I walked out on CVS a few years ago... it's fascinating to think of where I am now and none of this wouldn't have happened if I didn't step through the fire of fear and nerves quitting that hellhole. I had a really bad data entry job for 6 months at some point after that too, but once I get my next annual raise in a few months I will be doing really well again alongside one of the most casual and best jobs I've ever had for the last three years.

Definitely not gloating... I hope my experience is just an example of how risks can really work out in the end sometimes.

Fact: My diet has never been all that great, but I do my best... and in the time that I have moved home and not been cooking, my cholesterol has raised for the first time in my life. So looks like I need to up the fiber and try to talk parents into making less fried stuff.

Fact: I am doing well in a series of job interviews right now and I am terrified because there is a light at the end of the tunnel that is my current hell job and I am waiting for it to be snatched away from me again.

I was having an awful day, truly awful. It looked like my relationship was ending, and my entire life was being thrown into chaos. So I went down to the basketball courts near my house. It's like 8:30 PM, and there's not a soul on the court besides me. I'm missing all of my shots, because I'm so distracted and out of practice, and just all around, having a rough time, even on the court.

Everything is frustrating me a ton, and I had no friends or family to really turn to, and I was about to lose the person most important to me.

So I got down on my knees and prayed. Something I haven't done since I was like 10. I lost my faith around the age of 14, I think, but that's not too important.

Anyway, I got down and prayed for a solid 10 minutes or so, trying to have this deep conversation with someone I wasn't sure existed, or cared, or what. It was just a last ditch thing that I thought was totally rational in this situation.

Amazingly, after I finished praying, I went back and took a shot I never, ever make, even when I was really good back in high school, I'd never make the shot, because it was simply not one I could logically process the angle on.

It went in, swish, perfectly. I could not have shot it better if I had tried.

As I'm walking over to fetch my ball from directly underneath the basket, I see my phone vibrating, as I got a message. The message was from my girlfriend, apologizing for everything we had been fighting about (long story short, my life goal is to have kids, and she doesn't want them, so it prompted a huge fight between us - we've been dating for three years). She'd even come around a bit, and we'd come to an understanding and compromise, something I thought would be impossible.

This all seemed like too much of a coincidence for me. I went from having a bleak outlook on life, missing even easy shots I could hit in my sleep, and an utter collapse of everything I had come to know over the past three years, and in a span of about 10 seconds, the entire thing turned around.

The timing was just too great. I had so many chills in the moment, and I felt very unalone at that moment. I was kind of scared, but not in a way that felt unwelcome.

I don't know what happened, but it was a sort of miracle of some kind. I didn't think one could ever possibly happen to me.

Random fact: I sometimes use a playful insult: 'nine-ball'. This is basically a light-hearted synonym for the word 'idiot' because Chiruno/Cirno from Touhou is nicknamed this, after she is labelled in the instruction booklet of one of the games '9. BAKA'.

Your bringing up Stephen King reminds me of something from like a decade ago, I guess.

Being from New England (specifically living in a small town called "Durham", in Maine - King fans might understand why this is relevant), everyone there was always up Stephen King's ass.

I can get it, I guess, he's a famous person who lived in a small town, and graduated from a nearby school.

But it's one of the many things that ostracized me from that small town group. I don't like the Patriots, I don't like Stephen King (I'm not really fond of horror in general, but King's books in particular were hard for me to finish, not because of the content, but because I got bored with them), and I wasn't a typical redneck.

So I guess my point (and random fact about myself), is that I (like many of you, possibly) was pushed online, because of differences from my local peer group. I got tired of getting bullied for having different interests and tastes, and was never going to be able to pretend to like something I didn't.

Maybe that's my fatal flaw. I wear my heart on my sleeve, and among peers, I'm often at odds. I don't know if my brain is just wired differently, or if I was raised to never be a follower, or what it was, but sometimes I wonder how different my life would be if I could have pretended to enjoy things I didn't. It would be awful fake, but I wonder if I'd be happier.

I technically don't, being an only child, but my cousin started having kids when I was 10 and now they're in college. Yup, I watched them grow up, though they live on the other end of the state and only see them occasionally.

Brandon's got a niece and a nephew (and possibly one more, we're not sure yet. Whenever the paternity test gets done. *shrug*) The first two live up in Washington, but they'll officially by my niece and nephew after the wedding.

As for Prime, the only thing worthwhile is "The Man in the High Castle." Otherwise I just reap the benefits of free two-day shipping.

Random fact: My dad's favorite author is Stephen King. My mom says I was named for Jesus; Dad says I was named for the car.

Amazon does that... I have to say though I continue to be really disappointed with their Prime Video selection. Even when I look up bad B-grade movies or actors, etc, I never really find anything good I haven't seen yet. Maybe I'll finally cave and get Netflix someday.

Do you have any nieces or nephews? Now that's when time starts getting really weird... every time I see my family and sister my nephew looks like a different kid.